A Comparison of Self-realization in Black Boy, Native Son, Rite Of Passage, and The Long Dream

Black Boy, Native Son, Rite Of Passage, and The Long Dream: Self-realization of a Black Man

The white world dominates the political and social life in all of Richard Wright's books as Wright portrays the never-ending struggle that a young black male faces when growing up in the United States. Wright's Black Boy, Native Son, Rite Of Passage, and The Long Dream are all bound by the common theme of self-realization. In all four books, the climax occurs when a black youth realizes his position in society and the ugly future that lies ahead of him.

In his autobiography Black Boy, Wright reveals his personal experience as a black maturing in a white society. The process of achieving self-realization is marked by all the verbal and physical battles that the main characters in Wright's books must fight. He makes clear what all his characters experience, when he writes in Black Boy, "I had never in my life been abused by whites, but I had already become as conditioned to their existence as though I had been the victim of a thousand lynchings" (34). The powerful presence of whites in a black youth's life is embedded since birth but emerges clearly during the period of self-realization for the black youth

In Native Son, the main character, Bigger Thomas, lives in a one-room apartment with his mother, brother, and sister in a black ghetto on the South Side of Chicago. Bigger sees whites through hate- and jealousy-filled eyes. Feelings of inferiority to whites consumes Bigger's life. However, he tries to help his family by working for a wealthy, well-respected white family. But, in a moment of fear and hysteria, Bigger commits a murder that alters his life forever. Compared to the three other ...

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...: W. W. Norton and Company, 1982. 671-673.

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Tanner, Laura E. "Uncovering the Magical Disguise of Language: The Narrative Presence in Richard Wright's Native Son." Appiah 132-146.

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Wright, Richard. Black Boy. New York: Harper and Row, 1945.

_____. The Long Dream. New York: Harper and Row, 1987.

_____. Native Son. New York: HarperCollins, 1993.

_____. Rite of Passage. New York: HarperCollins, 1994.